Los Angeles County
0Loading crowd target
0Loading crowd target
7correct to beat the crowd
50 free Los Angeles County trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Los Angeles County is the most populous county in the United States, and it is far more than one big city. It contains 88 incorporated cities, each with its own city hall and council, alongside dozens of unincorporated communities that the county runs directly. Some of those cities are household names. Others cover a single square mile, or have more factories than residents. This quiz covers how the cities got their names, when and why they incorporated, which landmarks, studios and stadiums belong to which city, and the famous places people assume are cities but are not. The county's mountains, islands and neighbours make an appearance too. It is written for Angelenos who want to know their own backyard, for newcomers trying to make sense of the map, and for anyone who enjoys local geography and history.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which Los Angeles County city, home to the ocean liner Queen Mary, is the county's second most populous?
Long Beach
Long Beach is also the largest city in California that is not a county seat. The Queen Mary, an Art Deco liner from 1936, is docked there permanently.
Q 02Which resort town in Los Angeles County is the only incorporated city on Santa Catalina Island?
Avalon
Avalon is also the southernmost city in Los Angeles County. Chewing gum magnate William Wrigley Jr. took control of the island in 1919 and built the town's landmark Catalina Casino.
Q 03Which Los Angeles County city hosts the annual Tournament of Roses Parade and the college bowl game that follows it?
Pasadena
Pasadena held its first rose parade in 1890, sponsored by a local social club called the Valley Hunt Club. The city is also home to the science university Caltech.
Q 04Which Los Angeles County city, known for Rodeo Drive, is almost entirely surrounded by the city of Los Angeles?
Beverly Hills
Beverly Hills covers under six square miles. It touches only Los Angeles and one smaller neighbouring city, so it sits like an island inside its giant neighbour.
Q 05Which Los Angeles County city, famous for its amusement pier, is the western terminus of historic Route 66?
Santa Monica
Santa Monica is bounded by Los Angeles on every side except the west, where it meets the Pacific Ocean. Its pier was built in 1909.
Q 06Which Los Angeles County city, headquarters of The Walt Disney Company, is nicknamed the Media Capital of the World?
Burbank
Burbank takes its name from David Burbank, a dentist who set up a sheep ranch there in 1867. Warner Bros. is headquartered in the city too.
Q 07Which Los Angeles County city is home to SoFi Stadium, where the NFL's Rams and Chargers both play?
Inglewood
Inglewood saw SoFi Stadium open in 2020 on the site of a former horse racing track. The city's older arena, the Forum, was home to the Lakers and the Kings for 32 years.
Q 08Which neighboring county, now home to Disneyland, was split off from Los Angeles County in 1889?
Orange
Orange County separated from Los Angeles County in 1889, with Santa Ana as its seat. San Bernardino and Kern counties had already been carved out of the same parent.
Q 09Which Los Angeles County city, nicknamed the Hub City, was made famous by the rap group N.W.A?
Compton
Compton got the nickname Hub City for its central position in Los Angeles County. It is one of the county's oldest cities, the eighth to incorporate, back in 1888.
Q 10Which Los Angeles County city, home to the Sunset Strip, did not incorporate until 1984?
West Hollywood
West Hollywood became a city in 1984, on land that had stayed outside every surrounding city. Hollywood itself was independent only from 1903 until it merged with Los Angeles in 1910.
Q 11Which Los Angeles County city, founded to be exclusively industrial, had only 222 residents at the 2020 census?
Vernon
Vernon is the second least populous city in California, behind only Amador City. Its founders incorporated it in 1905 beside three major railroads, as a home for factories rather than families.
Q 12Which city, named from the Spanish for squashes, became Los Angeles County's newest when it incorporated in 1991?
Calabasas
Calabasas incorporated on April 5, 1991. Its name is an old Californio spelling of calabazas, usually linked to the wild squashes that grow in the area.
Q 13Which Los Angeles County city, host of the annual county fair, is named after the Roman goddess of fruit?
Pomona
Q 21Which Los Angeles County city, its fourth most populous, has one of America's largest Armenian communities?
Glendale
Glendale elected its first Armenian council member, Larry Zarian, in 1983, and he became mayor three years later. By the mid-1990s Armenians and Latinos outnumbered the city's Anglo population.
Q 22The Los Angeles County city of Palmdale has been called the American capital of which industry?
Aerospace
Aerospace became Palmdale's main employer after the Air Force set up Plant 42 in the 1950s. The Space Shuttle, the B-2 bomber and the SR-71 Blackbird were all built, tested or serviced there.
Q 23Which Los Angeles County city built America's first musical road, which plays part of the William Tell Overture?
Lancaster
Pomona got its name in an 1875 contest, from a winning entry submitted by Solomon Gates. By the 1920s the city was known as the Queen of the Citrus Belt.
Q 14Which studio town in Los Angeles County was home to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1924 to 1986?
Culver City
Culver City is named after Harry Culver, who incorporated it in 1917. The old MGM lot is now Sony Pictures Studios.
Q 15Which company's second West Coast refinery gave the Los Angeles County city of El Segundo its name?
Standard Oil
Standard Oil of California bought the land in 1911, and the name is Spanish for "the second". The refinery entered its second century in 2011 under the company's later name, Chevron.
Q 16Which Los Angeles County city is home to the world's oldest operating McDonald's restaurant, opened in 1953?
Downey
Downey is also called the birthplace of the Apollo space program, whose systems were developed at a plant in the city. NASA took over the site from the Air Force in 1961.
Q 17Which Los Angeles County city, where Richard Nixon grew up and went to college, is named after a Quaker poet?
Whittier
Whittier honours the poet John Greenleaf Whittier, and its Quaker settlers deeded him a lot in the new town. Nixon later practised law from an office in the city's bank building.
Q 18Which Los Angeles County city was the childhood home of Brian, Dennis and Carl Wilson of the Beach Boys?
Hawthorne
Hawthorne was named after the novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne, who shared a July 4 birthday with a founder's daughter. A historic landmark marks the site of the Wilson family home.
Q 19Which Los Angeles County city became the nation's first contract city in 1954, buying its services from the county?
Lakewood
Lakewood voted in 1954 to incorporate rather than be annexed by a bigger neighbour, then hired the county to run its services. About half the county's cities now buy their policing the same way.
Q 20Which unincorporated Los Angeles County community holds a major film studio lot and the theme park beside it?
Universal City
Universal City is county land with no city government of its own. Its boundaries were adjusted in 2015 so that the entire theme park sits inside the unincorporated area.
Lancaster has the first musical road in the United States, and drivers know its tune as the theme from The Lone Ranger. The city lies in the Antelope Valley, in the western Mojave Desert.
Q 24Which Los Angeles County city was formed in 1987 by uniting Valencia, Saugus, Newhall and Canyon Country?
Santa Clarita
Santa Clarita is the third most populous city in the county. Six Flags Magic Mountain, often assumed to be part of it, actually sits just outside the city limits on unincorporated land.
Q 25Which Los Angeles County city renamed its airport Zamperini Field after local track star and war hero Louis Zamperini?
Torrance
Torrance was founded in October 1912 and named after Jared Sidney Torrance, the developer behind it. Zamperini graduated from the city's high school.
Q 26Which Los Angeles County city is home to the soccer stadium where the LA Galaxy play their home games?
Carson
Carson only became a city in 1968. The Galaxy's ground is part of Dignity Health Sports Park, a complex that also has a tennis stadium and a track and field facility.
Q 27Which Los Angeles County city is home to Santa Anita Park racetrack and to peafowl that roam its neighborhoods?
Arcadia
Arcadia's free-roaming peafowl are a remainder of a 19th-century ranch, whose owner brought the birds from India. On his farm they helped control snakes and snails.
Q 28Which Los Angeles County city, incorporated in 1913, is home to the Huntington Library and its botanical gardens?
San Marino
San Marino takes its name from the tiny European republic, by way of a family plantation in Maryland. The city's seal is modelled on the republic's, three towers and all.
Q 29Which small Los Angeles County city, a 1920s oil boomtown, is completely surrounded by a much larger port city?
Signal Hill
Signal Hill incorporated in 1924, about three years after a well called Alamitos No. 1 erupted there. The oil field it tapped became one of the most productive in the world.
Q 30Which peak in the San Gabriel Mountains, nicknamed Old Baldy, is the highest point in Los Angeles County?
Mount San Antonio
Mount San Antonio rises just over 10,000 feet on the border of Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties. Locals use the nickname so often that many would not recognise the official name.